Author's Notes: I wanted to experiment with a bit of angst. This chapter is very much an experiment on my writing habits, as well as how much music influences what I write.

...Suffice to say, you'll know how much when you reach the end of this. You'll also know exactly what kind of piece it was. :P

Quickly on the subject of Everlasting Bonds, the newest chapter is still being written(and at 6000 words, I kid you not), with one more scene to go before it's ready. Those of you who read it, I think you're in for a great time.

Now, I hope you people enjoy this fanfic. It is not traditional angst, but it is rather good still.

Dark Rain

Her tent was crying tears of shredded pages. The ground was covered in them. Any approaching step would have been heard, as it would've trampled on these shattered dreams. Books of strategies and tactics, now useless, all of them.

Her head lay sunken in her arms. Moisture pooled under her nose and right cheek. She'd cried, cried, and cried. She had given in to the darkest despair, only to come back and realize that there was nothing for her to return to. Her fingernails had bitten deep into her palm, drawing out blood, but she hardly felt the pain any more. Only the darkness remained, the feeling of nothingness like a cold void, a coat on her shoulders.

The dreams got trampled upon. A warm object clacked down close to her forehead, promising to chase away the gravely chill choking her soul. But she didn't want to touch it. It would bring back the pain.

A voice, gruff, and tightly controlled, said, "Drink it." It was the voice of a man who'd lost as much as she had. It made Robin raise her head, and when she did, a drop of wetness flowed down her cheek, splattering against the torn books on the ground.

"I... I can't."

"Drink it."

No questions. No requests. Just a stone-faced demand for her to consume what lay in the cup. She eyed it tiredly. Sleep medicine? Could well be... They knew she was devastated, that she was at loss. Gerome could put her to sleep afterwards.

But what lay beyond the simple cup of warmth? Forgetfulness? A moment of emptiness?

She covered her eyes as the memories flooded over her again. Her lips felt dried and cracked in the moist evening air.

It'd rained...

It was raining today. It might even rain tomorrow.

With these thoughts in her mind, she drew her sword from its scabbard, raising the weapon against her enemies. Chrom already had his weapon up in the air, and was raising a yell that promised victory, instead of the blood-letting that was about to begin. Behind them, the leftovers of the Feroxi army and Ylissean forces stood their ground, lifting their arms as one.

Unity. It could be a beautiful thing.

Robin smiled at the sound of the men yelling, feeling the energy running down her body, to meet the fear that had begun it's usual course through her legs and stomach. She felt she could survive, and return to the girl that fought with the strength of ten men. Indeed, for the brunette beauty that was her daughter, she would survive.

Robin let out a sob and crashed her arm against the table. The cup of steaming hot liquid bopped up, then fell down unbalanced on her nervously wrapped fist. A scalding feeling spread over it, causing her to gasp out a shout.

Gerome quickly appeared at her side, wiping the hot drink from her hand with his own. How it must've burned him. "Sorry."

"Think nothing of it," Gerome said, flicking his hand, spatters of drink spreading over the black-and-white covering of the ground. He turned around, crumbling paper as he went, and picked up a towel from one of their personal rucksacks.

"Use this," he said, throwing it back to Robin. She didn't feel like moving, so the towel hit her face like a wet rag, wrapping itself around the back of her head.

She didn't even hear the pages rustle. "Here..." A hand took hold of the other side of the towel, unwrapping it from her face and lowering it toward her hand. Within half a dozen gentle strokes, the wetness disappear, only a stain on Robin's sleeve to remind her of its existence.

Just like that, things could vanish. Forever gone, only smouldering flames to remind one of what'd once been.

The guttural cry of a wyvern pierced through the rainy landscape. They were on a peaceful mound of grass, away from the battlefield. Three shapes in the beast's shadow, two of them hunched over the one that coughed spittles of blood. A man held the fragile shape, her head leaning on his forearm. The knee that was steadying her back was thick with blood from the wound, a gap of flesh torn open, its meaning simple - fatal.

She hacked gouts of blood out, and the woman holding her face cried out. "Morgan! MORGAN!"

The girl smiled. She had always smiled. Then her head fell down limply, against the hand and arm of her mother and father. The woman at her side cried out in despair.

The smile had frozen on the girl's face, eternally plastered under the closed eyes.

After the burial, they would never see that smile again.

Robin felt tears in her eyes. Would they never leave her alone? All this suffering, and the excruciating, tearing pain inside...

For what? Her baby, her sweet daughter... She wouldn't come back.

And Robin would not smile again, she felt.

Two arms wrapped around her, enshrining her within. Gods, but she was tired.

She finally let the unconsciousness take her, crashing against her husband's arms.

Mom...

Robin stirred, a familiar feeling gripping her. What was this? This couldn't happen. She wouldn't subject herself to the torment again.

"Mom! Mom!"

She became aware of the prickling straws caressing her fingers. Her head was leaning against something soft, yet firm. A palm, callused by training and battle.

He'd never used reins... Gerome, that is.

Robin blinked her eyes, taking in the slowly clearing grey sky and the forces traipsing around the massive line of fallen, sometimes offering a hand to lift up a person. It all felt so surreal.

"I'd rather you didn't dive in like a madman, next time."

This voice...Robin tried to look toward her right. Before she could, though, something heavy and constricting slammed against her stomach, coiling around it. "Urk!"

For a moment, she couldn't make out what manner of creature had attacked her. Then as the haze in her eyes cleared, she could see her daughter's brunette hair greeting from near the abdomen, the rest of her face buried within. Morgan was also gripping Robin's coat, clearly with an intent to never let go. "Idiot! Idiot!"

With each repetition, Morgan pushed her head deeper, to the point where Robin started thinking that it was this that would kill her, not the poisonous, sharp throbbing that she felt in the lower back.

"We need her intact, Morgan," the voice from her right side spoke.

The pieces started clicking in Robin's head, forming a vague image of what was going on. "Chrom..."

"In person," he answered. "How's your back? You got a really nasty hit."

"I... wouldn't really know, would I?"

"It was bad," said a voice from behind. Sweet, sweet Gerome. Always so curt, though.

Robin resolved to pat his head, whenever Morgan stopped her domestic abuse. Any time, now.

"Idiot, idiot!"

Or perhaps not. Robin sighed – or rather, grunted in pain - and leaned backwards, forcing Gerome's hands lower. She faced his brown eyes, noting the slight redness. "Miss me?"

"Perhaps a bit."

"Just a bit?"

Gerome went silent for a while. Then something flashed in his eyes, and he glanced at the girl whose arms reached around Robin's waist like a ring, and was stuck just about as adamantly. "Morgan. Your mother's breathing shallower."

"GAAAAH! IDIOOOOOOT!" the girl shouted, slamming her head down so hard that the blow almost reached Robin's back where the other source of her pain resided. Instantly, the white haze returned to Robin's field of vision, accompanied by a slowly encroaching darkness.

"...Are you sure she'll be all right?" Chrom asked, his voice growing dimmer in Robin's mind. She was being pushed down by the pain, and the feeling of lost control began to arch through the sides of her head, blurring her faculties.

"She should be," Gerome said, the inflection of his voice growing somewhat worried. "Morgan, stop that. Otherwise, your mother will really die."

"No! Mom! Stay with me!"

Robin could've sworn that the pain managed to reach a new all-time high.

I'll get you yet, Gerome, she swore. Leeks. You hate leeks. I'll sprinkle leeks on your bed. In your tea. I'll... get... you.

Her last memory, before falling unconscious, was that of gratefulness. She had lost nothing, and never had. That alone, in the face of the war still unfinished, was enough to grant her a peaceful sleep.